Ewig
by Ofdensocks
Summary: They knew his mighty heart must be broken, and they couldn't begin to imagine the pain he was in. But even if it took a well intentioned deception, they were going to help him through. HeavyMedic, a hint of SniperSpy later on.
1. Verlust

"...vake up, doktor."

The form that lie in the huge Russian's arms did not move. It did not laugh maniacally. It said nothing wholly inappropriate in German. It did not suddenly spring up and saw someone's head off just to see what would happen. And it wasn't coming onto him.

This was wrong, disturbing, unacceptable.

"Comrade doktor. You will vake up now please?"

Heavy shook him a little. The body wobbled a bit but still made no move on its own accord. The chest of the German's pristine labcoat grew stained further and further in a crimson both similar to and wholly different from his team's colors.

"Doktor...? I am going to help you! You will being okay, okay?"

He lay the Medic down on the floor of their hiding place gently. The smaller man still did not stir.

"...vatch over him, Sasha... tis cannot be tat hard to do..."

Carefully, he pulled the backpack off of Medic and looked at the Medigun attachment so often used on him. It was a gun, right? He knew guns. Just point and fire. Right?

"_So, how does it vork, doktor?"_

_"Hah! Vell, quite obviously, not just any dumkompf can make this vonderful invention virk. If just anybody could do anything, than I would be herr Heavy Veapons Guy und YOU vould be the Medic."_

"_Aren't you just pointing and shooting?"_

"_Absolut Nicht! Zere are SETTINGS. You can't just blast anyone at any setting. It does not VIRK that vay. Ah, you silly man, vy do you vorry about it? You do vat you do so vell. I vill take care of you."_

"_And if you are hurting? Who vill care for you, herr Doktor?"_

"_Ach... mien lieb, mien lieb. I have mein Ubercharge to look after me, but more than zat, i have you. I do not virry about zese things because I know mein Heavy vill keep me safe as I keep him safe. Do you believe zis as well?"_

_"Da. Of course I do."_

"_Then stop zis needless virry, you silly man."_

And so Heavy fired. Nothing. He fiddled frantically with the knobs on the backpack_. Please. _Fired again. Still nothing. His enormous frame shivered, shaking hands twisting the knobs, firing, and twisting the knobs again, over and over. Nothing happened.

At last, having exhausted all other combinations, Heavy cranked all the knobs on the backpack up to their highest setting. Even Medic himself, who adored witnessing the most disaster-prone scenarios play themselves out 'in the name of science', had remarked that only a world-class _dumkompf _would do such a thing, as it would surely make the Medigun explode.

Heavy didn't care. He pulled the trigger. A rush of red light flowed out of the nozzle with tremendous force, the backpack making ominous crackling and popping noises and growing very hot on Heavy's back until...

KLUNK.

It didn't explode, but it did stop working. No matter how many switches he flipped or knobs he turned, the Medigun would no longer fire.

"Nyet... Nyet nyet NYET... herr Doktor... I am sorry...!"

"...you... silly mann. C... c... come here...?"

His voice was so soft. So faint. But it was there. Eyes lighting up with hope, Heavy cast aside the broken Medigun and picked Medic off the ground as gently as he could.

"...closer, please?"

Heavy leaned in. Medic's cheek rested against his own rough, stubbly one, his lips close to Heavy's ear. His breathing was labored, and his words were so quiet that, even this close, they were hard to hear.

"...ich...liebe dich... ich... liebe..."

And there was no more. No more words, no more movement. No more breathing.

Nothing.

--------------

It was hours later, long after BLU had given up searching for Heavy and the Medic their Sniper had 'sworn t' GOD' he'd shot in the heart and left, when the rest of team RED set out to look for their two missing members. It took them a good while- it was a very good hidey-hole that Heavy had found and Demoman grumbled that it'd be faster to just raze everything- but soon enough, they caught a very strange sound.

It was a heavy sort of sound. Thick. Wrenching. Sort of like choking but not quite, like gasping but not really. Scout got a bead on where it was coming from, and the other six followed him.

The sound was Heavy. And Heavy was crying. That was shock number one- Heavy never cried. He had no reason to. Heavy laughed, he roared. He shot things into other, unrecognizable, bullet-riddled things. He ate 'sandviches' by the gross. Heavy made bad jokes, and occasionally said something surprisingly wise. But he never cried.

Once team RED got past that... there was shock number two. The reason Heavy was crying, the dark haired, unmoving reason clutched to his chest, staining his shirt a darker red. A pair of bloodstained glasses laying on the ground.

Medic. Crazy, morbidly curious, arrogant, brilliant Medic, who'd loved nothing better than learning new things in the most disturbing manner possible, working for the greater good of RED... and Heavy. Anyone could see that Heavy was the only thing that truly made Medic happy that didn't involve vigorous amounts of bloodshed, and the feeling was... extremely mutual.

But none of that really mattered now. Medic was dead.

Nobody knew what to say.

Notes: Hey there. I'm relatively new to TF2, and... what can I say. Heavy/Medic grew on me. There'll be more to come- in the meantime, please leave feedback! I wanna know if I'm doing this right. :3

And Nao, a quick translation for those who don't speak German:

Ewig - Everlasting  
Dumkompf - Idiot  
Absolut Nicht! - Absolutely not!  
Ich Liebe Dich - I love you


	2. Begräbnis

RED team buried their Medic at sunset. No BLUs came out to interrupt them- whether the other team was taking the opportunity to scheme or actually had the respect not to attack a funeral was anyone's guess, but it wasn't really relevant- they were staying in their own fort, and that's all that really mattered to the REDs.

The doctor was laid peacefully in uniform in a fine, sturdy coffin that Engineer built, beside a six foot deep grave that Soldier dug with Shovel. His red-gloved hands were laid peacefully upon his chest, his freshly-polished glasses resting on his nose. He could have been sleeping.

"...wait. We forget something..."

Turning from the yard, Heavy went back down below to their barracks, just off sickbay. Looking around a bit, he finally came across what he was looking for- a beautiful old violin, well cared for, tuned, and maintained, lying in its velvet-lined case.

Heavy held the instrument to his chest, fresh tears welling in his eyes. Medic's playing had always held him in awe. Something so beautiful shouldn't have been able to exist in a place like this, and some would say that such music shouldn't have been able to come from such a cold man. But Heavy knew better- Medic was not as icy as he seemed, and regardless, his playing was so lovely that no one on the team, no matter their personal taste in music, could say a bad thing about it.

His doktor should not be without his beloved violin.

Carefully, he brought the violin back up and placed it on Medic's chest, closing his hands over it as he knelt beside the coffin.

"...my Doktor..."

He bent his head down, resting his forehead against Medic's. Tears ran down his face, dripping slowly onto the dead man's and spilling off, making it look like the doctor was crying, too.

"My... beautiful Doktor..."

The rest of the team looked to each other, misty-eyed in spite of themselves. Soldier took off his helmet, Engineer following suit, and Scout and Sniper removed their hats as well, the assassin rubbing at his eyes under his sunglasses.

"...poor bugger..."

Pyro stepped forward and gently laid a hand on Heavy's trembling shoulder, speaking softly to the Russian.

"Dnn crr, Hrrvy... rrsh grrn br rrkyy, rrsh grrrta brr."

The firestarter's touch was warm, which was far from surprising. What was surprising was that his consolation really did help a tiny bit. Sighing, Heavy reached up and gave Pyro's hand a quick squeeze and murmured a thank you.

As everyone solemnly said their own goodbyes, Engineer closed the casket and buried it, then played a song on his guitar. It wasn't quite a hymn, and it wasn't anything classical. It was beautiful, though. Bittersweet and lonely.

"Y'know... this ain't a proper military funeral. What we need here is a 21 gun salute."

Scout looked up at Soldier, cocking an eyebrow.

"Well, nice thought, but there's, like, eight of us. Eight ain't twenty-one, last time I checked."

Tucking his guitar away, Engineer grinned, and picked up his toolbox instead.

"I got it covered. Gimme a few ticks, I'll have up twenty-one beautiful sentries, an'..."

"Wait."

The Texan looked over, smiling kindly at the Russian."

"Yeh, Heavy?"

"...build fourteen. They fire, and we is doing the rest."

Demoman took a drink from his bottle and thumped Heavy on the back.

"There's an idea, laddie. I say we do it."

The rest of the team nodded in agreement. It seemed only right. Smiling, Engineer set to work. Fifteen sentry guns, all set to fire one right after the other. Solemnly, the remaining eight members of RED team stood beside them, wielding pistols, scatterguns, flamethrowers, rifles, grenades, and Sasha.

Lacking a bugle, Sniper began to whistle 'Taps'. As the last note carried over the desert, the guns began to fire, lighting up the dusk with flashes of gunfire and a rain of bullets, a blast of flame, booming explosions, and finally, a massive spray of hot, loud lead.

Even Soldier thought it was the best 21 gun salute he'd ever seen.

* * *

"_Doktor, vat is it? You cannot sleep?"_

"_Nein. Ze nightmares keep coming back."_

"_Poor Doktor. Come here. ... You must'nt keep blaming self for things that happened so long ago. I telling you this. Nightmares might go if you do."_

"_Ach... mein Lieb. If you only knew... ze things I have done. Terrible things. Such... terrible... things, to those who probably did not dezerve zem... if you knew, you would not love me."_

"_Do not say things like zat. Is stupid. Maybe you have done bad things. Everyone has. But you are sorry for zem. I can tell. And if you regret... means you are not monster. You my Doktor. And I love you no matter what you have done."_

* * *

Heavy's sleep was tumultuous and unpleasant. It wasn't that he was having bad dreams, per se... it was that his dreamspace was as hollow and empty as the space in his bed that his massive hands kept groping at in vain, expecting to find something that would never be there again.

He dreamed of black holes and lost-sounding echoes. Shadows of warmth, gentle lips upon his throat, the touch of learned hands that knew how to play the human body as well as his violin. And he could see the shine of his beloved's beautiful sharp eyes, his dark, peppered hair, his handsome face and perfect body and those wonderful, amazing hands... all just beyond his reach, fading further away the harder Heavy tried to reach for him.

He woke in a cold sweat with a sharp gasp, grasping for Medic and then, sadly, remembering that Medic was not there.

Heavy didn't want to go back to sleep, nor did he want to rise. The only stirrings in the fort were Soldier's- he was always up at the crack of dawn and had long since given up trying to get everyone else to follow his example, and had only more recently given up calling his teammates 'lazy pantywaists' to try and goad them into changing their minds.

Apparently this morning he had a new vigor for the idea, because it wasn't long before Heavy heard his teammate's sharp bark at his door.

"ALRIGHT, HEAVY, GET UP! MOVEMOVEMOVEMOVE! COME ON!"

Sigh, long pause. He pulled the blanket over his head. Just because he didn't want to sleep anymore didn't mean he wanted to get up. Frankly, he didn't know if he'd ever feel like getting up again.

Soldier seemed to be anticipating this.

"DAMNIT YOU ARE NOT STAYING IN AND MOPING ALL DAY. YOU ARE GETTING UP AND WE ARE GOING RUNNING DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME?"

"...go away."

Sighing, Soldier stops yelling and leans in the doorway.

"Look. It ain't gonna be any good for ya, stayin' in here like this. I've seen people go nuts like that. Wasn't pretty."

The Russian made a noncommittal grunt.

"Tell y' what. Just do a lap around 2Fort with me. You don't wanna do any more, you can come back in. Just... fuckin' humor me, okay?"

Lifting his head, Heavy looked at the American with a bleary sort of glare.

"I do this, little man vill shut up?"

"...sure. Now, c'mon, get up, throw somethin' on, let's move!"

Grunting again, Heavy pulled on some clothes. Obnoxious as he was being, Soldier meant well, and he may as well humor him a little.

The two started jogging, Soldier keeping his pace slower than he was used to at first so the slower Russian could keep up. After a bit, though, he started going faster.

"C'mon, lady, you can keep up with me, let's go!"

Grunting, Heavy did his best to move faster. He wasn't used to it, and he could feel the strain, but somehow it also felt pretty good. Da. He could keep up with the loud little man.

And then, a red blur whizzed by both of them, jogging backwards in front of Heavy and Soldier.

"Hey, chuckleheads! You call that runnin'? I can go circles around both of you big loads!"

Soldier leveled a glare at the grinning Scout, then over to Heavy.

"Damnit, Heavy, are you gonna let the private talk to us like that?"

"What, you two gonna make me sorry? You gotta catch me first, ya fuckers!"

Laughing, the young Scout took off like a shot, leaving Heavy and Soldier to chase after him. It wasn't easy for Heavy, but he found that the more he ran, the more the stitches in his sides fell away, and the faster he could go. He couldn't keep up with Scout- he was barely even keeping pace with Soldier- but it was faster than he'd ever gone before, and he was enjoying the game so much that, at least for the time being, his mind wasn't on sadder things. He wasn't desolately alone, wondering what he was going to do- he was just a guy roughhousing with his buddies. The sorrow wasn't gone by any means- he could feel it lurking in the back of his mind- but the respite was nice.

When they finally caught Scout, Heavy knew it was only because the younger man had let them... and, playfully driving his huge knuckles into the boy's scalp, he was grateful. He was sweaty and hot and panting and all but worn out- but he was still having a good time.

"OI! YOU THREE GONNA QUIT YER BLOODY HORSIN' ABOUT AN' GET BREAKFAST, OR WHAT?"

Sniper stood on his roost, shaking his head with a smile.

It was good to see Heavy laugh again, even though the Aussie knew it wouldn't last. Not yet. Still, it was good.

-------------

Phew! Super-sized chapter. I just started and couldn't stop. :3

I'm glad you guys are enjoying this. Next bit should be up in a few days. Demo will be involved, as will booze. *hee* 'Till then, thanks for reading!


End file.
